Refrigerating apparatus



March 21, 1933. L. (5.. co PEMAN REFRIGEHATING APPARATUS Filed Feb. 12, 1932 INVENTOR. L z, 0Y0 G COPINfl/V.

-- ATTORNEYS Patented Mar. 21, 1933 UNITED STATES I PATENT OFFICE.

LLOYD G. OOPEHAN, OI FLINT, MICHIGAN, ASSIGNOR TO COPEMAN LABORATORIE8 COM- PM, OF FLINT, MICHIGAN, A CORPORATION OF MICHIGAN nnrnronnn'rme nrruwrus Application fled February 12, 1932. Serial No. 592,572.

This invention relates to refrigerating apparatus, and has to do particularly with a simple manually operated manually controlled device for the local application of cold.

5 Heretofore, in the medical and surgical arts much use has been made of cold packs and more particularly small tubes of various kinds for the local application of heat or cold to both internal and external-portions of the human body. Even with the application of cold packs to external portions of the body, the results have been far from desirable because of inability to maintain a constant tem perature and more especially because of inability to maintain a sufliciently low temperature. This is also true in the treatment of certain portions of the nose and throat.

It is the object of the present invention to provide a refrigerating device which can be applied to any part of the body, either externally or internally, and which device can be formed into any size or length whereby heat ma be abstracted from any portion of the cooling or freezing internal portions of the body, said container being provided with passageways for the circulation of refrigerant. The temperature at certain points or certain parts of the container whatever may be its shape, may be-varied by varying the thickness of certain parts of the container well. To keep this device at a constant temperatureand to obtain any temperature de- Fig. lis an elevation, partly in section, of

one form of CO; refrigerating device conbo y andthe temperature of that .portion of sired, I preferably utilize a C0 refrigerat' I cal in many instances.

nected up with my heat absorbing or what might be termed cold applying unit.

Fig. 2 illustrates a modification wherein the cold applying unit is embodied in the form of a tube.

'Fig. 3 is a sectional view taken on line 33 of Fig. 2.

Fig. 4 is a sectional view of a further modification of the cold applying unit wherein such unit 'is shown preferably'in the form of a cold pack.

It will be understood that the medicinal or surgical heat exchange-unit may take many different forms and may be made of many diflerent materials in accordance with the particular use to be made of the unit- For the purposes of the present invention,

applying units. About the only limitation in the design of the'cold applying unit is that it should contain circulating and/0r distribut in passageways.

n Fig. 1 Ihave illustrated a cold applying unit which may be generally designated 2 and 'which consists of a metallic cap member 3 having an inwardly extending partitlon forming portion 4. A bag 5 of any suitable material such as rubber or rubberized fabric may be attached to the cap portion 3. The attaching of the bag 5'to the cap portion will form a cold applying unit having a circulating conduit 6.

The partition portion 4 may contain a thermostatic unit 7 which maybe of the pressure bulb or any other suitable type. A suitable control gauge 8 may be used for indicating or controlling the effective 0 erating temperature of the thermostat 7. uitable valves 9 and 10 may be used for controlling the flow of refrigerating medium into and from the cold applying unit.

It willbe obvious that the use of a volatile.

refrigerant for a device of this kind would hardly be practical and certainly would be dangerous and any mechanical refrigerating system whatever the method of heat transmission, would not only be expensive but its lack of mobility would make its use impracti- To make the medicinal or surgical cold applying unit safe at all times and to make its use simple and practical regardless of the particular place of use, I preferably use solid CO as illustrated at 11 as the refrigeratin medium and in making use of this solid G 2 I provide a container 12 sealed except for a relief valve 13 and a thermostatically controlled valve 14.

The relief valve 13 may be set to maintain any desired pressure within the container 12 and in all instances the pressure maintained within the container by the relief valve will be low enough as to prevent the formation of liquid CO within the container. For practical purposes I have found that the relief valve may be set to maintain approximately ten pounds pressure within the container 12. A suitable conduit 15 connects the control -valve 14 with the inlet valve 9 of the con- 'tainer 2. I

In normal operation, the container 12 hav- ='ing been charged with solid CO the valve 14 may be so' regulated as to maintain, in com- \bination with the thermostatic control mem- "her 7, the proper circulation of evaporated ()0 gas to maintain the desired temperature within the cold applying unit. The nature -of such thermostatic control means will be understood by those skilled in the art and, regardless of whether the thermostatic memher 7 is of the pressure or temperature type, "it will be understood that the valve 14 will be open or closed to provide proper circulation of the CO gas to maintain a predetermined temperature within the container 2.

In the modification illustrated in Fig. 2, the cold applying unit is in the form of a rubber tube having a partition 16 for definin a circulatin passageway. In this modi cation the wa s of the tube may be made of different thicknesses as at 17 and 18 so as to vary the rate of heat exchange at certain localized points as desired.

In the modification illustrated in Fig. 41

have shown a cold pack somewhat similar-to the .unit shown in Fig. 1 except'that the partitions are formed integral with the unit as at 19., Such unit may be formed of rubber and to maintain any desired temperature a thermostatic unit 20 may be secured to a wall thereof. In this case temperature control is obtained preferably by varying the circulation of the CO lgases as above set forth inthe description of ig. 1.

The conduit 15 leading from the valve 14 to the cold applying unit may pass through the container 12 or directly from the valve 14 to the inlet valve 9 of the cold applying unit. While in normal operation all of the CO gas passing through the unit 2 will pass to the atmosphere through the outlet valve 10, it will be obvious that whatever might happen in the system the pressure throughout such system cannot rise above that determined by the relief valve 13. Accordingly, the walls of the cold applying unit may be relatively J is app ied.

thin and flexible without any danger of bursting and in case there should be leakage at any point no harmful results could occur because of the nature of the refrigerant used.

What I claim is:

1. A refrigerating system for the application of cold in medicinal and surgical uses, comprising a cold applying unit, a circulat- -ing conduit within said unit, a container for comprising a cold applying unit, a circulating conduit within said unit, a container for receiving a charge of solid CO means for conducting the vaporized CO gases into the circulating conduit of the cold applying unit, means for controlling the escape of gas from said container to maintain a relatively small amount of pressure in the system, and thermostatically controlled means for regulating the supply of CO gas to and through the cold applying unit to maintain the desired temperature therein.

3. A refrigerating system for the application of cold in medicinal and surgical uses, comprising a cold applying unit having at least a portion of its walls of relatively thin flexible material, a container'for receiving a charge of solid CO means for controlling the escape of said CO gas from said container, means for conducting at least a portion of the CO gas through the cold applying unit, and means for maintaining a relatively low pressure throughout the system.

4. A-refrigeratin system for the application of cold in me icinal and surgical. uses, comprising a cold applying unit having at least a portion of its walls of relatively thin flexible material, a container for receiving a charge of solid CO, means for controlling the escape of said C 2 gas from said container, means for conducting at least a.por-

tion of the GO, gasthrough the cold appl ing unit, and means for controllin t e amount of CO gas circulated throug the unit. to regulate the transfer of bleat units to the ortion of the .body to which the heat refrigerating system for the application of cold in me cinal and sur 'cal uses,

comprising a cold applyin least in part of flexible eIastic material, a container for receiving a charge of solid 00,, means for controlling the circulation of at least av portion of the vaporized .100 gases through the cold applying unit and means for maintaining the vaporized (30 at a relatively low pressure throughout the system.

unit ormed at 4 6. A refi'igera' tin system for the application of col in medicinal and am cal uses, comprising a cold gplying unit ormed at least in part of ru r, a container for rea ceiving a charge of solid 00,, means for controlling the circulation of at least a rtion of the vaporized CO gases through e cold applying unit, and means for maintaining the vaporized CO, at a relatively low pressure throu bout the system 7. A re ri era stem for the ap lication of col in r x i fii ial and sur cal u es, comprising a cold applying unit ormed at least in part of flexible elastic material, means for creating and supplyin refrigerant in the form of CO, to sai unit, said unit being so fabrica as-to provide passageways therein for circulating said 516s, and means for regulating the amount of gas supplied to said unit to control the temperature thereof.

8. A refri ratin system for the application of col in me icinal andsur cal uses comprising. a cold applying unit ormed of flexible elastic material, a circulating conduit formed within said unit, a container for receiving a charge of solid C0,, means for supplying vaporized CO, gas to said container, a portion of the wall of said unit being of, varying cross section so as to accelerate the heat transfer between a portion of the body and said cold applying unit at one or more localized points.

In testimon .whereof Iaflix m s' ature. y LLOYD G. 

